The weblog of Norman Geras

May 13, 2010

Anti-Semitism as attitude and as speech

In the post here Gilbert Achcar argues that Holocaust-denial in the Arab world is much less common than it is believed to be in the West, and that impressions to the contrary are fed by the media's giving prominence to instances of Holocaust-denial in the region while being less interested in covering Arab acknowledgements of the Holocaust and of the universal lessons it holds. I hope he's right about this, and I'm certainly not in any position to assess the balance of Holocaust-related opinion in the Arab world. On the other hand, I think that Achcar puts forward a highly dubious thesis in making the case. He writes:

Yet western-style Holocaust denial – that is, the endeavour to produce pseudo-scientific proofs that the Jewish genocide did not happen at all or was only a massacre of far lesser scope than that commonly acknowledged – is actually very marginal in the Arab world. Rather, manifestations of Holocaust denial among Arabs fall for the most part under two categories.

On one hand, there are Arabs who are shocked by the pro-Israel double standard that is displayed in western attitudes towards the Middle East. Knowing that the Holocaust is the source of strong inhibition of western critiques of Israel, many Arabs tend to believe that its reality was amplified by Zionism for this very purpose. On the other hand, there are Arabs who express Holocaust-denying views out of exasperation with the increasing cruelty of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. Unable to retaliate in kind, they believe that they can harm Israel symbolically in this way.

In both cases, Holocaust denial is not primarily an expression of antisemitism, as western Holocaust denial certainly is, but an expression of what I call the "anti-Zionism of fools".

I leave to one side the cogency of otherwise of the causal diagnosis offered; but what this does is to treat anti-Semitism as if it were exhausted by an attitude of mind, something inward, as opposed to its being a set of ideological and discursive themes and practices. There has been more than one major theme involved in anti-Semitic prejudice and practice historically, but I would have thought that in recent times Holocaust-denial has become one of the most prominent. Deployment of it is itself anti-Semitic, irrespective of the frame of mind in which it is uttered and of what the ulterior causes of its being deployed might be. To deny that millions of Jews were done to death in Nazi-occupied Europe is an odious lie harmful to the interests and the well-being of Jews. Racism and other forms of prejudice can often be traced back to prior social or political causes; but that doesn't undo their racist character.